One of my fondest Christmas memories was also one of our family’s bleakest（最令人沮丧的）.We were just little kids , and on Christmas Day mom   36 us all around her to tell us ,  37 ,that there would be no presents because all we really wanted was to  38 for our daddy.He was very sick . I don’t remember anything else except four little girls surrounding my mother, crying   39 a miracle（奇迹）
At that very moment ,someone   40 loudly on the door.  41 Behind him was a merry group of soldiers from the Army base where my father   42 as a minister . News had  43  that we were in trouble ,and his colleagues knew we needed some  44  .
With all the excitement ,even my dad  45  in a blanket to keep warm , came down and sat in front of a roaring fire in our room to watch his children be  46 by good Samaritants（乐善好施的人）. The presents were unwrapped , and we girls  47  packages and found a doll each and four board games.
What is  48  to me is that I don’t even remember what sickness my father was suffering from.I 49  remember an evening of laughter and  50  There were no expensive toys but    51 moments of friendship and fun given by young men who knew that a family was having a(n)  52 time . They gave their time and their  53 to little children who needed to laugh.
The most important thing in life aren’t things . And what about the true  54  of holidays ? I hope we all are able to remember a thing about the holidays that stirs(搅动)our heart , that isn’t really a thing at all, but the smile on a child’s face because we take a moment to hug or   55 a tear.
【小题1】A requested  B  commanded  C  gathered  D  recommended
【小题2】A in tears    B  in doubt     C  in silence  D  in surprise
【小题3】A apply     B   pray        C  pay      D  ask
【小题4】A to        B   with       C   for       D  in
【小题5】A knocked   B  beat        C   tapped    D  struck
【小题6】A Fighting   B  Shooting    C   Running   D  Following
【小题7】A charged   B   existed     C   governed  D   worked
【小题8】A expanded  B   spread     C   distributed  D  disappeared
【小题9】A confidence  B  cheer      C   trust       D  wisdom
【小题10】A dressed    B   attached    C   trapped    D   wrapped
【小题11】A persuaded  B   saved      C   taught     D   entertained
【小题12】A discovered  B  sought      C   unfolded   D  packed
【小题13】A strange     B   frightening  C   useful     D   encouraging
【小题14】A seldom     B   just        C   even      D   hardly
【小题15】A happiness   B   surprise     C   doubt     D   anxiety
【小题16】A shocking    B  priceless     C   worthless  D   beneficial
【小题17】A relaxing    B   great        C   ordinary   D   rough
【小题18】A praise      B   treatment    C   attention   D   response
【小题19】A theme      B   spirit        C   principle   D  theory
【小题20】A wipe away  B   deal with     C   write about  D  burst into

Recently I fully understood that a little favor could really make a big difference. My daughter and I were, accidentally, in time to catch a falling heart just before it hit the ground.

It all started when Charlene, one of my co-volunteers at the library, asked if I could do her duty on Tuesday since her doctor appointment had been unexpectedly changed. I agreed, which meant I  was home on Friday instead of volunteering as previously planned.

My daughter, Mary, managers a book store in town. Mid-morning, she called to ask me for help. Would I buy a fifty dollar gift card, birthday card, and cake for one of Mary’s assistant managers, Cindy?

Mary explained she had to call Cindy in to take the place of another assistant manager who was sick, but felt terrible about it when she discovered it was Cindy’s birthday. Cindy insisted that it was just fine. But that was not what Mary thought, so she gathered enough money from other employees to throw a surprise party for Cindy. Since neither Mary, nor any of the other employees, could leave to pick up the goodies, they were turning to me for help. Days later, Mary told me the wonderful rest of the story, “Cindy cried and cried when we surprised her. After the party, Cindy told us that her boyfriend had chosen that morning to break up with her. To top that off, she only had 26 cents left in her bank account.”

We were surprised at the series of unexpected events that took place in order to circle Cindy with love and catch her falling heart just before it hit the ground.

1.Why did Charlene ask a favor of the writer?

A. She had to see the doctor on Friday.    

B. She wanted to celebrate her daughter’s birthday.

C. She had an unexpected appointment on Tuesday.

D. She needed to prepare for her daughter’s birthday.

2.What can we learn about Mary?

A. She was a learned career woman.

B. She had uneasy relationships with her assistants.

C. She knew Cindy’s love story before the surprise party.

D. She played the most important role in this circle of love.

3.Which of the following couldn’t be the reason why Cindy cried?

A. She had to work on her birthday.

B.She had little money in her bank account.

C.She was greatly moved by Mary’s care and kindness.

D.She and her boyfriend parted that very morning.

4.The underlined word “goodies” refers to_________.

A. Gifts for Cindy      B. Good stories      C. Close friends      D. Goods on sale

                                   E

    Some people have it easy. When their kids ask them what they do at work, they can give a simple, direct answer: “I put out fires” or “I teach primary school”. As a theoretical physicist, I never had this luck. Society has come to expect many things from the physicists. It used to be that we only had to discover the basic laws of the world and supply the techniques that would power the next Silicon Valley. With these expectations we were fairly comfortable: they are the sorts of things we think we know how to do. What makes us uncomfortable and what makes it hard for us to tell our kids what we’re up to is that in this century we have become, though unwillingly, gurus on questions such as “What is the nature of Reality?”

    We now deal with a whole new class of problems. We ask how the world began and what the nature of matter is. The answers we are coming up with are just not easy to comprehend for the average person.

    So, when physicists get out of their cars in the morning, have a cup of coffee and sit down in front of their computers, they leave a familiar world and enter a place where things act in strange ways that are impossible for ordinary people to understand.

72. According to the passage, in a way physicists are        .

    A. honest         B. comfortable    C. strange        D. unlucky

73. By what the writer says about physicists, we know that physicists        .

    A. don’t like their careers

    B. live in two different worlds

    C. are coming up with new answers to old questions

    D. don’t have to tell people what they are doing

74. From the passage we can conclude that theoretical physicists        .

    A. contributed to the new industry in Silicon Valley

    B. only have to answer the basic questions about the world

    C. have disappointed the expectations of many people

    D. have found it hard to make themselves popular

75. What’s the main idea of the passage?

    A. Society seems to know a bit about physicists’ work.

    B. Most people are expecting to know what physicists are doing.

    C. Physicists are doing more and more difficult jobs.

    D. It’s impossible for average people to know physicists’ work.

When our son, Alex, was young, he hated to travel. We endured refusals to visit one more museum, even if it was the Louvre. We coped with a child who resisted even a taste of onion soup in Paris and who insisted he would like nothing more than ordering room service at the hotel and watching TV.

Over the years, we have come up with several hard-earned but realistic strategies to help kids cope on long-distance trips.

First, we recognize that some children have trouble adjusting to new environments, food, time zones and schedules. So, in advance of a trip to England, we gave our son a taste of the new culture by making shepherd’s pie for supper. He loved the mashed potatoes, chopped meat and brown gravy（肉汁）. For Italy, we sampled homemade pesto（香蒜沙司） served over linguine（扁面条）. For Amsterdam, I cooked up a pot of comforting pea soup and baked a delicious apple pancake called pannekoeken. Then, when we traveled to these places, he ate these foods and they seemed like a taste of home.

In addition to food, we always sample the culture beforehand by reading books and renting movies from the countries we will be visiting. For Italy, the book Italian Folktales by Italo Calvino and the films Johnny Stecchino, Cinema Paradiso, and Il Postino gave our son a glimpse of the Italian way of life. For Britain, we rented Mr. Bean and Billy Elliot, and enjoyed stories by J.R.R. Tolkien and E. Nesbit. For Amsterdam, he finished The Diary of Anne Frank.

Before we leave home, we also ask Alex to go through our tour books and pick out activities that appeal to him. He was excited about visiting the London Dungeon and the Imperial War Museum, and taking a ride in the London Eye. They turned out to be big hits. Because Alex’s preferences were given equal attention, he was more tolerant of his parents’ selections, such as visiting Charters Cathedral and the Van Gogh Museum.

We’ve also learned the hard way that dragging our son out of bed early in the morning ,thus making him grumpy all day. Now that he is a teenager, we let him sleep in while we sip coffee at a café, work out at the hotel gym, or take a long walk. This makes our time together much more enjoyable

1．According to the writer, parents are advised to _______.

A. cook children’s favorite food           

B. postpone traveling until the kids are in college[来源:Z_xx_k.Com]

C. allow their kids a ride in the London Eye

D. take children’s interest and preferences into account

2．Cinema Paradiso and Il Postino are mentioned as _______.

A. particular desires of children         B. an approach to interest the future possible visit

C. highly appreciated films for tourists  D. comfortable activities children could pick out

3．The underlined word “grumpy” in the last paragraph is similar in meaning to _______.

A. bad-tempered           B. tolerant           C. energetic             D. nervous

4．Which of the following might serve as a possible title for this passage?

A. Kids and Parents.                             B. Joys of Traveling.

C. Whether You Go or Not.                       D. How to motivate Kids to travel

Question: Why is it so hard for some people to apologize after they’ve done something wrong? I have made every effort to persuade my uncle to be nice to people that he knows he’s hurt.  71   How I wish things would be better if he’d just say he’s sorry and ask them to forgive him.

    Answer: 72  It’s just easier for him to pretend nothing happened than to face the embarrassment of admitting he was wrong. You’ve probably done the same thing yourself at some time. In fact, most of us have. Furthermore, what if others won’t forgive him even if he apologizes?

     73  Pride blinds us to our mistakes or faults. Or at least it makes us pay less attention to their seriousness.

    Pride also makes us unwilling to admit to others that we were wrong. Perhaps we’re afraid they will look down on us if we admit it.  74

    But others see through our pride. And things would be far better if we admitted our faults and asked for forgiveness.  75

    Now you know why your uncle refuses to apologize, talk to him again. Help him to learn how to apologize and ask for forgiveness from others.

    A. But a deeper reason is pride.

    B. But he just refuses to do that.

    C. We may even hope that somehow they will overlook it.

    D. As a result, you would offend others and hurt their feelings.

    E. There are a variety of reasons for your uncle’s refusal to apologize.

    F. Otherwise our pride would only hurt us and cause conflict with others.

G. One reason your uncle finds it hard to apologize could be embarrassment.